Buy it... if you desire a foreshadowing of the balance of vintage
jazz and orchestral sensitivity of James Horner's Cocoon: The
Return and Honey, I Shrunk the Kids.

Avoid it... if you expect Horner to treat the cute, mechanized
alien visitors in this film with the kind of truly unique instrumental
tones that Jerry Goldsmith might have afforded them.

EDITORIAL REVIEW

FILMTRACKS TRAFFIC RANK: #1,616

WRITTEN
8/21/09

BUY IT

Horner

*batteries not included: (James Horner) Originally
meant to be an episodic entry in Steven Spielberg's "Amazing Stories"
television series of the mid-1980's, the plot of *batteries not
included was considered too overflowing with potential to constrain
to anything less than a full feature film. Unfortunately, while
Spielberg produced the film and brought a lot of his comfortable talent
with him for Universal, he declined to schedule the film into his own
directorial schedule. Instead helming *batteries not included was
Matthew Robbins, and although he does a decent enough job of emulating
Spielberg's sense of wonderment for the production, Robbins was quickly
pounced upon by critics for missing the same touch. The basic
ingredients of an affable Spielberg story of the 1980's are all there,
however, merging concepts from E.T. and Cocoon to form a
story of two, small flying saucers from outer space that float into the
window of an elderly couple's New York apartment one night. That couple
is played by Jessica Tandy and Hume Cronyn (not only a real-life pair
but also both appearing the Cocoon: The Return the following
year) and they run a restaurant at the base of their apartment complex,
one that is the target of developers. The two little saucers mean well,
and after using appliance parts and household power to rejuvenate
themselves, they take on the cause of the couple in saving their
lifestyle. The picture is as cute as one could possibly imagine, though
despite strong special effects and Spielberg's influence, *batteries
not included did not tug at enough heart strings to be considered
truly memorable. No stranger to either Universal's Spielberg-related
productions or the genre of science fiction fairy tales was composer
James Horner, whose career was entering full swing (quite literally) by
the time *batteries not included arrived in 1987. The assignment
gave Horner the opportunity to stay firmly rooted in his comfort zone
within this narrow sub-genre, plucking many of the elements from his
music for Cocoon for rearrangement in *batteries not
included while also testing a few ideas that would receive
significantly more development in The Land Before Time the next
year. In retrospect, the music for *batteries not included really
doesn't offer a Horner collector anything newsworthy, especially with
better exploration of all of the various components of this score in
later efforts. Still, however, it is a serviceable score with only a few
detriments on album.

If anything, *batteries not included proves that
Horner was either obsessed with the style of Glenn Miller's vintage jazz
or simply really good at emulating it. The jazzy structures you hear in
this score are very similar to those of Cocoon: The Return. They
occupy a significant portion of the musical landscape here, opening the
film and providing spirited enthusiasm to the endeavors of the lead
couple. If you've never been appreciative of either the disparate
environment caused by this style of jazz in Cocoon: The Return or
the more extensive variations in Swing Kids, then *batteries
not included is limited in what it can offer you in its remaining
parts. Horner writes two themes for orchestral renderings, one of
mechanized percussion and bouncing woodwind rhythms for the alien
saucers themselves and then a more standard orchestral idea for lofty
strings that represents the sentimentality of the tale. The first theme
of descending mystery tinkers with creative sounds in "Night Visitors,"
though Horner's noise-makers and other devices to denote cute robots are
nowhere near as interesting as Jerry Goldsmith's similar employment of
creativity at the time. The prancing optimism of this theme sometimes
segues directly into the jazz, though a few of the perky combinations of
the two sounds are very similar to Horner's forthcoming Honey, I
Shrunk the Kids. The latter theme (the one of friendship) is a more
fluid orchestral one that opens the "End Credits" with a full statement
in typical Horner fashion after several flourishes in previous scenes in
the latter half of the film. Collectors of the composer's works will
notice significant similarities between this idea and one in The Land
Before Time, though the only complete and obvious connection comes
in the first thirty seconds of "Hamburger Rhumba." Outside of Horner's
rotation between these themes are a few unique passages, usually
denoting suspense with equally familiar Horner techniques. The entirety
of "Arson" (and a few jabs at the conclusion of "Farewell") consists of
slightly dissonant, melodramatic rumbling for lower performance elements
that culminates in a truly disturbing crescendo of despair at the end.
On the whole, however, *batteries not included is a pleasant work
that will appeal to devoted collectors of Horner's 1980's jazz-infused
scores. Only existing on an original MCA Records CD album from the
film's debut, the score has been difficult to obtain for decades. For
casual film music collectors, the recommendation here is the same as
that for Cocoon: The Return, though this score has more intrigue
to offer. ***@Amazon.com: CD or
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Bias Check:

For James Horner reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.16
(in 103 reviews)and the average viewer rating is 3.26
(in 193,093 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.